


so hug me, hug me because it's all I can handle

by kangelique



Series: The Emma and Killian Winter Fluff [2]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: 2 am heartfelt conversation, 2 am shopping, Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Beanies have a meaning, Christmas Cookies, Emma and her walls, F/M, Forehead Kisses, Friendship/Love, Gen, Hugs, Hugs to keep the cold away, Killian and his promises, Romantic Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:54:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27882578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kangelique/pseuds/kangelique
Summary: Emma Swan hadn't thought this through.What the heck was she thinking when she let Killian Jones tag along, wearing the black beanie she gave him and he never threw away?She was thinking about cookies, that's what. She was thinking of the boy in the picture. The boy she gave up. But now they're waiting at the bus stop and it's cold and they're both tensed up by everything that's been left unsaid, so Of. Fucking. Course. Killian decides it's the best time to confess things.Looks like her body AND her heart are about to find out what warmth is like.
Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan
Series: The Emma and Killian Winter Fluff [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1588822
Comments: 3
Kudos: 22





	so hug me, hug me because it's all I can handle

**Author's Note:**

> Based off the prompt: "You're warm, hug me"

**so hug me, hug me because it's all I can handle:**

Emma hadn’t thought this through, but to be fair, she wasn’t thinking a lot of things through these days. 

If she had thought this through, she would have realized what a long shot it was and how her old, worn out scarf couldn’t protect her from the harsh gusts of wind whipping her from either direction as she hopped from one foot to the other and blew air into her rubbing hands in an attempt to restore circulation 

Who cared if she looked like Bugs Bunny waiting for the damn bus, her legs nearly quivered with impatience. Not to mention her fingers had grown numb five minutes into standing and no amount of gritting her teeth calmed the chattering enough so Killian wouldn’t give her another stupid, concerned frown -that was problem number two.

She should have realized her heart would betray her as soon as her gaze landed on the beanie he was sporting. The same beanie she’d gifted him on a whim because it was a 2 for 1 deal. The color matched the hair peeking from under the edge, brushing his ocean blue eyes with each fresh puff against their faces, and tempting her with its silkiness as it shined under the lamplight. 

Honestly, it was...unexpected. She’d assumed he’d toss the beanie into the trash the second she was out the classroom, but he’d kept it and she wasn’t prepared to see him strolling across campus with it, holding it, pulling it on, taking it off to stuff it into his satchel. Her heart, her body, her trust,  _ everything  _ she’d given to Neal, he had shoved aside after deciding he was done with her. But Killian took care of the beanie. 

“I take it back,” Emma blurted, starling both Killian and herself. “We don’t need the cookies.” 

Correction: she didn’t need him to care. 

He arched an eyebrow, appearing unperturbed despite her obvious dismissal. “Alas, here we are,” he said with a hint of attribution and her eyes flashed, ignoring the faint flush on his cheeks and the red coating his nose reminding her of Rudolph in order to glare at him. 

“You wanted to come with me,” she half-shouted. 

He responded with a disbelieving scowl, “It would be bad form to let a lady wander into the dark on her own.”

Her eyes widened and quickly turned away from his insistent stare only to be smacked by how right he was. 

She wasn’t unfamiliar with the danger of the streets -life for a runaway orphan never left a choice-but sometimes she stormed out, to hell with the hour, the tricky little devil on her shoulder pushing her to believe if she’d survived this long, why couldn’t she survive a trip to Food Smart at two in the morning? 

Maybe it was the abandoned avenue, the occasional gunshot in the distance, sounds of a fight getting launched in an alley, the red, green, and yellow lights changing lazily, and the eerie road punching her heart with alarm when a car zoomed by catcalling her or pumping loud music as they shouted obscenities. She wasn’t seventeen anymore, but with the darkness trapping her, she returned to the girl constantly checking behind her shoulder at any noise until Killian’s presence registered again. 

Her fists suddenly tightened as she stuffed them into her jacket.  _ No.  _ She wasn’t that girl. She’d quit believing the ugly duckling could transform into a swan years ago. So what if having company on Christmas wouldn’t be so bad? She hadn’t asked him to tag along on her pitiful mission. She hadn’t asked him to fill the role of knight in shining leather bullshit. Now they were both stuck with her mood. 

“The only one who saves me is me,” Emma said, just to be super extra clear. 

“I’m much too aware of that,” he sighed. 

“Then I don’t get why you followed me,” she snapped. 

He’d been doing research by a lonely corner of the library and she’d been slumped at a table flipping through  _ Professional Women 2020 Edition  _ magazine, debating whether or not to try, to disappear the fifth grader’s teacher’s voice from her head who’d confirmed the worst: his life hadn’t been easy, he’d endlessly wondered why, and there was no one to blame her but because she’d been young and dumb, the ghosts of handcuffs keeping her hands tied, and a broken self-esteem that only imparted her the courage to steal again. 

She bristled when a palm, soft and warm and calloused, cupped her cheek. Her eyes instantly flit to her feet, begging the ground to swallow her whole so he wouldn’t feel the shiver of anticipation, of unrest that coursed down her spine and trembled her shoulders as he stepped closer, his breath the kind of breath she needed to chase the chill from her face as both their eyes closed in response to his pressing forehead. “Don’t you know, Emma?” he whispered huskily. 

Emma inhaled sharply and her traitorous bottom lip quivered with her real answer. She did. God, she did. And it was big and imminent, melting her icy exterior with more ferocity. “I don’t want to know,” she whispered back. His head on her lap on their Netflix nights, the little tradition they’d started with going to the Cheesecake Factory after a grueling week of finals, and the recent kisses that’d begun to move tender, slower, and farther than before meant something she didn’t want to label. 

“Try something new, darling.” She shook her head slightly, moving away, but he followed, caressing her cheek with his nose and catching her forearm. “It’s called trust.”

Didn’t he understand?  _ Of course  _ she trusted him. 

“Excuse me?” Emma breathed and shook her head. In agreement or disagreement? She didn’t know, but his lips were painfully close, teasing inches away from meeting hers. Her eyelids fluttered as his arm snaked slowly around her waist, tugging her against his chest and her hand -originally intending to push-brought him rougher to her. She could kiss him. She could kiss him right now and worry about it later-

“You’re afraid to talk.”

Her eyes snapped open. “I’m talking to you right now,” she frowned. 

“-to reveal yourself,” he continued softly, frowning back at her. “All would go much smoother if you did.”

She stepped back, finally looking at him and his chapped lips didn’t seem so appealing now that he’d mentioned feelings. “You wish,” she scoffed and crossed her arms as she turned to face the bus stop. 

“I bloody well do. Perhaps if you hadn’t been so hasty to get away from the likes of me, then we could have gauged a better form of transportation,” he grumbled

Emma shrugged, chin punctuating the air. “Whatever.” His jaw clenched out the corner of her eye. Good. Hopefully his vein popped and he realized scaling her walls were pointless. They were too high and too necessary for him to succeed, for him not to pack his love one day and make her the speck of dust you flicked off your rearview mirror. 

The silence stretched. 

Emma shifted, chewing on her lip as common sense arrived to tap on her shoulder. Killian had stiffened, staring straight ahead with the same hunched shoulders she’d come across multiple times when grades were in for the semester and his weren’t enough, his weren’t Liam’s, his slurring droning on and on about reaching the bar. She glanced at him and opened her mouth to stutter on an apology when the obvious smacked her. 

He wasn’t Neal. God, no.

She suspected Killian couldn’t help but be earnest and wear his heart on his sleeve -as she had. Once. But he wasn’t Liam either. Liam was flawless, but Killian was imperfect. He’d confessed his imperfections to her in the dark, in her dorm, after a hesitant hug and his ocean eyes reflecting his bad day.  _ The likes of me _ he’d said. What the hell did that mean? Did he really think he wasn’t one the decent ones? Idiot. 

Killian Jones was an idiot. 

“Why did you say the likes of me?” Emma suddenly demanded, eyes losing their battle for a soft approach when she glared daggers at him. “What, you think I don’t-”

“Care of anyone in this town?” he finished irately, adding his own fuel to the fire and it worked, it always worked, because her frown sharpened with his and her fists tightened. “Aye,” he fumed, nose breathing heavily. 

“I do care!” Emma threw her hands up, waving them wildly so the looming grey clouds and his gloomy expression would understand she only knew what caring meant because of a fourth grade vocabulary assignment. Her heart, her head, everything associated caring to Disney Channel movies about friendship and love and all the things she’d failed to do right. Caring was a remote island, the one where Killian was stranded, and she was rowing and rowing but the waters quickly chopped with her baby steps. 

Damn it. He was so wrong. She cared so much it was almost liked she’d walked through a field of caring her entire life. 

“Your actions as of late leave much to be desired, Swan,” he mumbled wearily. 

She flinched but instinctively said, “It’s none of your business.” Yeah. She’d been avoiding him. She’d purposely kissed him harder to halt his lips from getting bold and getting sweeter. 

A beat passed. “It could be,” Killian said, so gently and so hopeful that tears crowded in her eyes. 

“It can’t,” Emma sniffed. “I told Mary Margaret, I’m not the roommate type. One-nighters are as far as I ever go. It’s why I’m in this mess.”

He turned to face her and her regrets. He didn’t blink an eye. He stared at her and he laid out his vulnerability at her feet as his hand reached for her cheek. “All I want is your honesty, love,” he smiled a small smile. 

She bit her lip but moved into his space, dipping her cheek into the cushion of his palm. “I’m freezing,” she sighed, eyes falling closed as his thumb caressed her trembling lip.

“Here.” He began to unzip his jacket. 

“No.” She zipped him back, ignoring his pout when she went up to his chin. Her fingers traced his neck, featherlightly dancing on the base of his throat before sliding down his chest. “You’re warm,” Emma murmured, gaze searching for his permission to step closer and closer, until her boots hit his and her walls plummeted. “Hug me.”

He collided with her at the same time she did, arms slipping around his waist as his arms wrapped around her shoulders. The force of their chests crashing knocked the air out of her and restored it in one go when he buried his face in her hair, unsteady breath brushing her ear, and she nuzzled her cheek against his heart for once, listening intently for a moment for the rhythm that reassured her she hadn’t broken this, whatever this was, with her Emmaness. Messiness. Just messy with the miserable pieces of honesty she could afford to give him. 

He pulled her closer. 

And she went, willingly, allowing herself to hold onto him a little harder, a little less afraid as her hands pressed her relief into his skin. 

He sighed against the crook of her neck, probably savoring. 

And she squeezed her eyes shut as he heated all the parts of her that were cold. 

“They’re not for me,” Emma finally said in a rush. 

“What’s that, Swan?” Killian asked quietly, sounding like she’d towed him away from a dream. 

She swallowed the lump that’d sprung every time she remembered her choice. “The cookies.” She blinked, fast and hard, as the memories flared and shuddered her body. Screams and pain and strangers encouraging her and a wail that echoed long after she claimed she couldn’t be a mother, she wasn’t anything, how could she do it? “They’re for him,” she whispered, she’d prayed his life would be better. “For Henry.”

He hummed in recognition. “The lad from your photograph?”

The same picture she’d swiped off the floor after her second confrontation with Regina Mills. Regina had raked her eyes over her, humphed, and proceeded to open her wallet for a bribe. Her mouth had overwhelmed with no’s. The  _ audacity  _ Regina had, waggling the bills in her face in the middle of the street like she was still poor as dirt. Emma refused and continued to see Henry behind Regina’s back, continued to realize Henry was lonely, depressed, and unloved. 

Henry was her. 

“They’re his favorite.” Regina kept him on a strict diet. No carbs if she wanted them to look good for their photoshoots for the  _ Working Mom  _ publications. But Emma was enemies with the desire to want something and never receive it. “He still believes in Santa Claus too.” A tear slipped down her cheek. “I didn’t, but I want him to.”

Killian was silent for a moment and then he pulled back and  _ this was it, wasn’t it?  _ She’d spilled too much, he’d heard enough, and -he wiped her tears and placed a soft kiss on her forehead. “Come along, darling,” he said, hand skating down her arm to entwine their fingers together. “We’ve cookies to purchase.”

Emma glanced at their joined hands and the new twinkle in his eyes. “You still want to come?” she asked, her lips edging on a smile. 

“Of course,” he replied, tucking a strand behind her ear. 

Her smile grew into a grin. “Okay.” Out the corner of her eye, headlights gleamed and signaled the bus nearing them. She turned to face him again. “Hey.” His gaze met hers and her smile faded into a straight, sincere line as she gently pushed on his neck and rose on her tiptoes to bump her forehead with his. “Thanks.”

“When I win your heart, Emma, and I will win it, it won’t be because of any trickery.” She shook her head.  _ It’s yours. I think it’s already yours.  _ His fingers strengthened in hers and dragged up her sides to grasp her cheeks. “It will be because you want me.”

“Hey! You two lovebirds are gonna get in or what?” a voice called out, breaking them apart as the double doors unleashed warmth against the one they were currently radiating. 

“Don’t get any ideas, Jones,” Emma half-warned as she took her seat by the window. She tugged on their joined hands, refusing to cut their newfound link even as his eyes looked to read her mind. She withheld on any promise burning her tongue and instead scooted so their knees touched and their thighs aligned. 

He leaned in. “Not my love?” he whispered, lips brushing hers. 

Emma closed her eyes. She couldn’t give him more than this, more than stroking his jaw from time to time. Right now, this was all she could handle. “Not your love,” she whispered back and fused her mouth to his

But as his fingers delved into her hair, sinking as deep as her tongue, something told her she didn’t have to be lonely, depressed, and unloved forever. 

Not when Killian offered to accompany her on her cookie escapade the next Christmas and the one after that and then when Henry was living with them. 

****  
  


**Author's Note:**

> -Thoughts?


End file.
